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PICASSOS was a UK government funded programme to improve the ability of automotive supply chains to develop complex software-intensive systems with high safety assurance and at an acceptable cost. This was executed by a consortium of three universities and five companies including an automotive OEM and suppliers. Three major elements of the PICASSOS project were: use of automated model based verification technology utilising formal methods; application of this technology in the context of ISO 26262; and evaluation to measure the impact of this approach to inform key management decisions on the costs, benefits and risks of applying this technology on live projects. The project spanned system level design and software development. This was achieved by using a unified model based process incorporating SysML at the system level and using Simulink and Stateflow auto-coded into C at the software level.

Design verification technology promises comprehensive analysis of design models against the specified properties, thereby overcoming the limitations of traditional simulation-based and testing-based approaches. It helps in detecting design bugs early, thereby reducing the software development cycle time and cost. In this paper, we present our experiences with three state-of-the-art design verification tools - Reactis Validator, Simulink Design Verifier and Embedded Validator - for Simulink/Stateflow models. We also identify some challenges in employing them in an industrial production environment. We also suggest some automation steps to ease the design verification effort.

The ever increasing number and complexity of software-controlled features in today's automotive vehicles mandate the use of numerous techniques and tools for ensuring the absence of any kind of defects in them. In this connection, one of the key areas of applied research today involves the identification, development and use of various analyses on Feature Requirements so that any defects can be caught early in the system development lifecycle.